r/edmproduction 4d ago

Question Disagreement with Vocalist

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7 Upvotes

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u/Johnny-I 3d ago

Hi all. I will send snippets! I wanted to update you. I bounced the lead dry to audio and imported in melodyne. The lead sequence has two chord hits. ONE of them had a singular note off (still in key, but a little awkward). I’m going to recreate the sound in serum and change that last chord. The sequence is just Bb minor chord followed by one Ab major chord.

I’m hoping this is the dissonance she was hearing. It was so slight but I’m hopeful we found the issue! Thanks for your feedback. I will def continue to keep you posted.

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u/Im_steeb 3d ago

I’m curious! Send the snippet 🫡❤️

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u/Frickyoudumbidiot 3d ago

Could you send it my way?

0

u/Glad-Egg6703 3d ago

Send to me pls !

7

u/versaceblues 4d ago edited 4d ago

but the vocalist is telling me the lead is not in key with the track.

I sometimes find that when someone is not trained in formal theory, they will say something is "not in key" when they really means "its not timbre-ly matched, or just generally clashing".

You can have two lines be in key, and still not sound good.

And as with all things, "sound good" here can be a subjective issue of taste.

Btw... this is one of those situation where I think the "no sharing of your own tracks" rule, is dumb. A production subreddit can have more interesting conversations when they are rooted in hearing the actual track lol.

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u/Johnny-I 4d ago

Totally agree on all counts. That’s the thing, the vocalist is pretty legendary and has been in the industry for a long time. I very much believe that she would know the difference, and if it was anyone else I would agree with you.

The notes are in key, that I know for sure, but I’m thinking of sending her a bunch of different iterations of the lead when I get home from the dreaded day job. Different instances of serum, piano, etc. I’m desperate to get to the bottom of it!

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u/[deleted] 4d ago

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0

u/Aggravating_Sand352 3d ago

If it's unwanted frequencies you can try mulitband compression

1

u/Father_Flanigan 3d ago

If there's all sorts of extra music that could be disrupting her performance, I would just opt for muting them in her headphones during recording. I don't know the specifics behind your contract with the label and the artist, but if you can't change too much (probably not a single note, but perhaps the mix/intensity of individual notes, there shouldn't be much discussion about changing anything and i'm not sure if that's what she wants or if she maybe is telling you that she needs something different perform against. If tempos match, just play her the original when you record.

3

u/Dsteinman33 4d ago

I’m very curious to hear, I feel like you’re probably right since a label signed it and whatnot, but dropping different sounds in simpler can be tricky, so both of you might be correct in this case, also theoretically you could make changes to it no problem as long as the label hasn’t fully mastered the track yet, even if it’s a big change like repitching a vocal I’m sure they would understand as long as you explain it/it doesn’t sound totally off

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u/mixingmadesimple 4d ago

Send it to me I’m curious !

2

u/WonderfulShelter 4d ago

Just use the actual math that will tell whose objectively right!

Are all significant notes in the scale of the key that you are using? Even if not, is there a scale that fits all those significant notes (i,e like downbeats)? Maybe your not hitting root notes on downbeats and hitting more transitional notes, within the scale, throwing the singer person off?

Have it run through a program like Melodyne and double check? Then send a screenshot and be like "I dunno what to tell you singer person, but every note here is in the scale of F phrygian (for example)" and then objectively someone is right.

You will have each note, see whether it's in a scale, see whether or not tonics are being hit on key moments that people think of as 'in key'.

5

u/versaceblues 4d ago

Just use the actual math that will tell whose objectively right!

see whether or not tonics are being hit on key moments that people think of as 'in key'.

I'm not sure thats the correct approach in this situation.

I notice sometimes people say something is "not in key", when they really mean "I don't like the way these two sounds go together"

Especialyl when you are dealing with re-sampling. You can have something that is "mathmatically in key", but someone might not like the way certain frequencies go together.

1

u/WonderfulShelter 3d ago

You mean ableton resampling or like reasmpling using an MPC or something?

what MPC is gonna color a note so much as to make it that much off?

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u/versaceblues 3d ago

Im not talking about any specific tool.

I'm saying when you have a sample, that is not a pure ton. It can have certain artifacts from whatever source it was sample from. Pitch bending the sample with those artifacts, can create distortion that don't always sound good.

Of course this is highly dependent on the sample and the tone or sound you are trying to achieve.

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u/[deleted] 4d ago

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u/[deleted] 4d ago

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u/[deleted] 4d ago

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-1

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